Part 25

Simultaneously with typhus there appeared the first cases of an epidemic ophthalmy. Although the eye affection was not as general as the typhus—it occurred only in some of the divisions, and then at the outset not so severely as later on—both evils were evidently related to each other by a common causal nexus. They appeared simultaneously under similar circumstances, but never attacked simultaneously the same individual. Whoever had ophthalmy was immune against typhus and vice versa, and this immunity furnished by one against the other evil lasted a long period of time. Both diseases were very often cured on the march. We found confirmed, says Krantz, what had been asserted a long time before by experienced physicians, that cold air had the most beneficial effect during the inflammatory stage of contagious typhus. For this reason the soldiers who presented the first well-known symptoms of typhus infection: headache, nausea, vertigo, etc., were separated from their healthy comrades and entrusted to medical care, and this consisted, except in the case of extraordinarily grave symptoms, in dressing the patient with warm clothing and placing him for the march on a wagon where he was covered all over with straw. The wagon was driven fast, to follow the corps, but halted frequently on the way at houses where tea (Infusum Chamomillae, species aromaticarum, etc.) with or without wine or spiritus sulphuricus aetherius were prepared; of this drink the patient was given a few cupfuls to warm him. As a precaution against frost, which proved to be a very wise one, hands and feet were wrapped in rags soaked in spiritus vini camphoratus. For quarters at night isolated houses were selected for their reception—a precaution taught by sad experience—and surgeons or couriers who had come there in advance had made the best preparations possible. All the hospitals between the Vistula and Berlin, constantly overfilled, were thoroughly infected, and thus transformed into regular pest-houses exhaling perdition to every one who entered, the physicians and attendants included. On the other hand, most of the patients who were treated on the march recovered. Of 31 cases of typhus of the 2d. battalion of the infantry guards transported from Tilsit to Tuchel, only one died, while the remaining 30 regained their health completely, a statistical result as favorable as has hardly ever happened in the best regulated hospital and which is the more surprising on account of the severe form of the disease at that time. An equally favorable result was obtained in the first East Prussian regiment of infantry on the march from the Vistula to the Spree.

There was not a single death on the march; of 330 patients 300 recovered, 30 were sent into hospitals of Elbing, Maerkisch Friedland, Conitz, and Berlin, and the same excellent results were reported from other divisions of the corps where the same method had been followed.

A most remarkable observation among the immense number of patients was that they seldom presented a stage of convalescence. Three days after they had been free from fever for 24 hours they were fit, without baggage, for a half or even a whole day’s march. If the recovery had not been such a speedy one, says Krantz, how could all the wagons have been secured in that part of the country devastated by war for the transportation of the many hundreds of sick.

At the beginning of the sickness a vomitium of ipecacuanha and tartarus stibiatus was administered (though on the march no real medical treatment was attempted); later on aether vitrioli with tinctura valerianae, tinctura aromatica and finally tinctura chinae composita aurantiorum with good wine, etc., were given. It is interesting to read Krantz’s statement of how much some physicians were surprised who had been accustomed to treat their patients in hospitals according to the principles of that period, which consisted in the exclusion of fresh air and the hourly administration of medicine. The mortality of those treated on the march in the manner described was never more than 2 to 3 per cent.

As already mentioned, an epidemic ophthalmy spread simultaneously with typhus among a large number of the troops returning from Courland, especially among those who formed the rear guard, in which was the first East Prussian regiment to which Krantz was attached.

In a far greater proportion the men of the two Prussian cavalry regiments and artillery batteries which Napoleon had taken with him to Moscow, that is into ruin, succumbed to the morbid potencies which acted upon them from all sides.

On March 17th., 1813, York’s corps entered Berlin, and from this time on contagious typhus disappeared almost completely in this army division. It is true that occasionally a soldier was attacked, but the number of these was insignificant, and the character of the sickness was mild. Other internal diseases were also infrequent among these troops during that time. Epidemic ophthalmy, however, was very prevalent in the East Prussian regiment of infantry. From February, 1813, until the day of the battle of Leipzig, 700 men were treated for this disease. The character of this ophthalmy was mild, and under treatment the patients completely recovered within a few days (nine days at most) without any destructive lesion remaining. Quite different from this form was a severe ophthalmy which appeared in the army toward the end of the year 1813, and also during the years 1814 and 1815.

AFTER THE SECOND CROSSING OF THE NIEMEN

Out of the enemy’s country, on their way home, the soldiers had by no means reached the limit of their sufferings. Instead of being able now to take the much longed for and so much needed rest they were compelled to keep on marching in order to reach the meeting places designated to them, the principal one of which was Koenigsberg.

Before entering Prussia they had to pass through a district which was inhabited by Lithuanians who had suffered very much from the army passing on the march to Moscow, and who now took revenge on the retreating soldiers.

Most happy were the Germans of the army breathing again the air of their native country, and they could not restrain their feelings when they found themselves in clean dwellings.

Their first occupation was to restore themselves in regard to cleanliness, to free their faces from a thick covering of dirt intensified by smoke which could be compared with a mask. All these unfortunate men wore this mask, but, as they said while in Moscow, without any desire to dance. Especially the better educated ones among them felt ashamed to present themselves in this condition in which they had dragged themselves through Russia and Poland.

On December 16th, von Borcke and his General, von Ochs, came to Schirwind, for the first time again in a Prussian city. Quarters were assigned to them in one of the best houses, the house of the widow of a Prussian officer. The lady, on seeing the two entering the house, was astonished to learn that they were a general with his adjutant, and that they should be her guests. Nothing about them indicated their rank, they were wrapped in sheepskins and rags full of dirt, blackened by the smoke from the camp fires, with long beards, frozen hands and feet.

On January 2nd., 1813, these two officers arrived at Thorn. They considered themselves saved from the great catastrophe, when there, like in all places to which the wrecks of the grand army had come, typhus broke out. General von Ochs was stricken down with this disease, and his condition did not warrant any hopes for recovery. His son, however, who had gone through the whole retreat wounded and sick with typhus, whom the general and his adjutant had brought from Borodino in a wagon under incredible difficulties, had recovered and was able to nurse his father.

And General von Ochs came home with his Adjutant, von Borcke, on February 20th., 1813.

Good people took pains to give their guests an opportunity to clean themselves thoroughly; the well-to-do had their servants attend to this process; in houses of the working class man and wife would give a helping hand.

Sergeant Schoebel, together with a comrade, was quartered in the house of an honest tailor who, seeing how the soldiers were covered with lice, made them undress and, while the wife boiled the undergarments, the tailor ironed the outer clothing with a hot iron.

Generous people tried to ameliorate in every manner possible the need which presented itself in such a pitiful form.

Lieutenant Schauroth was sitting in despair at a table in an inn when one nobleman pressed a double Louisd’or into his hand and another placed his sleigh at the lieutenant’s disposal to continue his journey.

In Tapiau a carpenter’s helper, himself a very poor man, begged among his friends to obtain a suit of clothes for Sergeant Steinmueller, whom he had never known before.

But cases of this kind were the exception; in general the Prussian peasants remembered the many excesses which, notwithstanding Napoleon’s strict orders, the soldiers had committed on their march through East Prussia; they remembered the requisitions, they felt the plight of Prussia since the battle of Jena, and they revenged themselves on the French especially, but even the Germans of Napoleon’s soldiers had to suffer from the infuriated, pitiless peasantry. Holzhausen describes scenes which were not less atrocious than those enacted by Russian peasants.

And those who were treated kindly had the most serious difficulties: the sudden change from misery to regular life caused many serious disorders of the organs of digestion, ennervation and circulation. All who have been in the field during our civil war know how long it took before they were able again to sleep in a bed. The Napoleonic soldiery describe how the warmth of the bed brought on the most frightful mental pictures; they saw burnt, frozen, and mutilated comrades and had to try to find rest on the floor, their nervous and their circulatory systems were excited to an intolerable degree. After eating they vomited, and only gradually the ruined stomach became accustomed again, first, to thin soups and, later on, to a more substantial diet.

How much they had suffered manifested itself in many ways after the thick crust had been removed from their body and, above all, after what had taken the place of shoes had been taken off. When Sergeant Toenges removed the rags from his feet the flesh of both big toes came off. Captain Gravenreuth’s boots had been penetrated by matter and ichor. Painful operations had to be performed to separate gangraenous parts. In Marienwerder Hochberg found all the attendants of Marshal Victor on the floor while a surgeon was amputating their limbs.

But these were comparatively minor affairs, amputated limbs played no roll when hundreds of thousands of mutilated corpses rested on the fields of Russia.

An enemy more vicious than the one that had decimated the beautiful army was lying in wait for the last remainder which tried to rally again.

It was the typhus that on the road from Moscow all through Germany and through France did its destructive work.

This disease had been observed, as Dr. Geissler reports, first in Moscow, ravaged most terribly in Wilna and held a second great harvest in Koenigsberg, where the first troops arrived on December 20th.

One-half of those who had been attacked succumbed, although the hospitals of Koenigsberg were ideal ones compared with those of Wilna.